Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles .300 WSM?

The OAL issue is not about case capacity (having to seat bullets too deeply), it's about jump to the lands. It's fairly typical for spitzers to hit the lands at 2.900" + depending on the bullet. The M700 box won't allow you to get close to the lands, unless you swap it out with a Wyatt's.

..... which also turns the M700 WSM from a balky feeder (at BEST; my donor would literally sometimes not feed, period!) to an absolute slick-as-snot joy to cycle. The tradeoff is going from 3 rounds in the belly to two. The WSM Wyatt's extended box does require a minor modification to the action.

The 700 is just not an ideal WSM platform, hence the SAUM's. The M70 or Kimber are far better platforms. 2 down is a zero to me.

Don't have a problem with 2 down personally, but to each their own.

Love my WSM Kimber MT, but they are what they is and you cannot really fiddle around much with barrel profiles and stocks etc.

M70 trigger options are very few (for the FN builds) and a great trigger is a necessity for me for precision shootin'.

M700's take a little effort to make a great WSM (or SAUM) platform but, 2-down notwithstanding, are superb once you jump through a couple hoops.

Another option is to go AICS detachable mag. The 6.5 SAUM I just build does that. 3 down (or more if desired!), feeds like butter. Starts getting a bit tacticool <grin> but just a little Elmer Fudd elsewhere in one's kit can counterbalance that.

I'm completely familiar with the OAL issue. I'm using 150gr PTSP bullets, and will be seating them to the cannelure....won't be spending too much time trying to get them to the lands. I'll be happy with 1-1.5" 3-shot groups at 100 yards, should be more than accurate enough out to a max of 300 yards.

I gave on getting my 300 WSM to shoot my handloads set to SAAMI length. I finally realized that the box on my M70 would allow me to get the bullet near the lands. The groups started sucking down to around one inch. After a little more tinkering with charges the rifle now shoots consistant MOA instead of the 2-3" groups it was shooting.